Category Archives: Partnership Working

Sparling Fish Project

Today, Primary 5 together with our Eco Group were delighted to welcome Jack Wootton into school to talk about a special project which he is working on behalf of Galloway Fisheries Trust. Our young learners were very interested to hear about how the Sparling are endangered, having once been in 15 Scottish rivers, they now survive in only three. One of these rivers is The Cree.  Mr Wootton explained how sensitive the fish are to any conditions which might change the environment of the river they are living in. We heard about water dams, pollution and intense fishing all being issues affecting the species. We also learned about the life cycle of Sparling including where they spawn, how they are washed down to estuaries and then their movement back up rivers when conditions are best. Mr Wootton is working to safeguard the Sparlings’ existence in the Cree and is also looking to introduce the fish back into other suitable rivers. The children learned about how important it is not to make detrimental changes to our eco system. It was interesting to hear that, historically, that the River Urr once had Sparling too. The children were also intrigued to learn that the fish smells like cucumber, that its body is transparent when looked at from the underside and that some eggs are so small, they are less than 1mm in diameter. The children were asked for suggestions about how we can safeguard this species in Scottish rivers for the future and there were many good ideas put forward. Our Eco Group and Primary 5 are very keen to been involved in this project as it continues over the next few months and to track its progress. The children were also excited to hear there was possibility that Mr Wootton might be able to bring in some real live Sparling for us to look at!  We are very grateful to Mr Wootton for his interesting talk: many of our young people found his enthusiasm for his work very motivational and he may even have inspired some of them to pursue careers in safeguarding wildlife in the years to come!

  

  

Fairtrade Breakfast 2.3.18

Thank you to everyone who braved the weather conditions to come into school early today for our Fairtrade Breakfast. We had 82 people attending which is a super turn-out in our bid to share awareness of Fairtrade food items.  Activities such as these help us to retain our Fair Achiever status for our school. We are very grateful to assistance from Mrs Houston from Dalbeattie’s Hospitality department and the school kitchen and also to Mr Parker, Mrs Dyson, Mrs Cox, Mrs McMinn, and Mrs Robison for all their help. And of course we are so grateful to Kinnairds, Dalbeattie Co-op and Tesco Castle Douglas and to Mary Van Zwanenberg from the Kirkcudbright Traidcraft Group for supporting our event with donations of Fairtrade food items. Here are just a few of the pictures from the event. Any profits raised is going towards purchasing Fairtrade footballs to help to continue to spread awareness.

  

  

  

  

 

Piping in P1!

Last week P1 were lucky enough to have a visit from a very talented S4 pupil.  To finish off our Scottish topic work Shannon McMinn came along and played the bagpipes for us!  We all thought she was fantastic and I think a few people around the school just might have heard her too!!

We also performed our own Scottish dance, ate some tasty shortbread and shared some work we produced comparing the Island of Coll and the town of Dalbeattie.  Last but not least, Jessica performed her winning poem.

Fairtrade Achiever Award Presentation with Eco Group and DHS Pupils

Today, we were delighted to have two representatives from Dalbeattie High School, along with our own Eco Group at a special presentation given by Mrs Dyson, our Primary 5 teacher. Mrs Dyson has been very busy, over the last few years, planning a range of Fairtrade activities with her Primary 5 class and eco group as part of our ‘Fairtrade Journey.’ Mrs Dyson first outlined the activities, comprising mainly of an audit of staff and pupils about Fairtrade products,  which were undertaken to achieve the ‘Fair Aware’ award. She then explained the activities which followed before we were awarded the ‘Fair Active School’ award in 2015: presentation to local community and Fairtrade snacks at an afternoon tea amongst many others.  Then in 2017, the school was awarded the ‘Fair Achiever’ award following still more activities which included a Fairtrade Breakfast and whole school assembly with a  Fairtrade representative. Since then , the Primary 5 class has also organised a Fairtrade games afternoon and a Fairtrade morning break time staggered over two days and met with a company who supply Fairtrade school sweatshirts so that these can be offered also to parents to buy complete with school logo. This week finds us in DGlife as we prepare for our next Fairtrade Breakfast next week on Thursday 1st March. Thank you to all who have already shown support for this event by buying tickets and to the local businesses (Kinnairds, Co-op and Tesco) who are supporting us with donations of Fairtrade food items.

  

Scots Poetry Assembly

Today, we heard all our winners from Primary 1 to Primary 7 recite their poems which they had been practising recently. The quality was excellent and it was clear why they had all earned first places in the recent competition.

Primary 1-3 winners

Primary 4-7 winners

Presentation of certificates to pupils missing from last week’s photo.

Primary 7 second and first place winners of the Burns collage competition based on Tam O Shanter

….and another prefect was presented with her badge.

Dalbeattie Nursery Boat Naming Ceremony

The sun shone on a very special boat naming ceremony at the new Dalbeattie Learning Campus on November 9th. The children in Dalbeattie Primary’s Nursery were thrilled to see their new play item officially named ‘Everest Skye,’ a name they had picked themselves, based on a popular TV programme. Sir Malcolm Ross, Lord Lieutenant for the Stewartry performed the ceremony, watched on by excited children and invited guests who included Lady Ross, members of Solway Yacht Club and representatives from Grahams Design Team and D&G Schools For The Future together with the school’s management team.
In order to install a play feature designed by the landscape architect, Project Manager Andy Little was tasked with finding a boat. He made contact with Solway Yacht Club who gladly came to the rescue. The club has donated a laser dinghy which they have lovingly restored and painted with  the boat’s name and yacht club emblem. Commodore of the club, Ian Purkis, also presented the school with a pennant from Solway Yacht Club and made a speech about how much the club wants to encourage more young sailors from Dalbeattie to get involved at the club at Kippford. Sir Malcolm and Lady Ross also presented the school with the Stewartry Flag so that the school can fly it from their flagpole once it is installed. The party of invited guests then had a tour of our wonderful new campus.    

   

 

 

 

Fairtrade visitor to P5

Mrs Dyson was delighted that Mrs Van Zwanenberg (a member of Kirkcudbright Fairtrade group) once again, was able to visit our school and work with pupils discussing issues around Fairtrade. Primary 5 pupils shared their knowledge with our guest speaker and Mrs Dyson was very impressed with the quality of questions they asked. Pupils learned more about how communities use the Fairtrade Premium. They also explored packaging of Fairtrade goods to identify what percentage of the product is made from Fairtrade ingredients. We would like to say a massive thank you to Mrs Van Zwanenberg for her support and input with our Fairtrade work at Dalbeattie Primary School.